Over the holidays, we ate a lot of desserts. We had pie, cakes, candy, cookies and bread pudding. Most people don’t think of bread pudding and say “Yum!”. Honestly, I always associated it with mushy bread that was flavorless and boring. A few years ago my older sister introduced our family to a bread pudding recipe that my grandmother had copied from a popular New Orleans’s restaurant The Court of Two Sisters on Bourbon Street. The recipe was complex and delicious. I replicated it this Thanksgiving and everyone raved, but it was a lot of work. So the week after Christmas my Dad asked if I could make bread pudding again and I was not thrilled with the idea. I wanted to do something easier, with fewer ingredients and make a bourbon sauce that did not require me to stir it slowly for ½ an hour. So I took out my trusty Better Homes and Garden’s cookbook (that was published in the 1960s) and turned to the bread pudding recipe. We did not have day old french bread, so I decided to substitute some cinnamon raisin bagels. This allowed me to forgo the cinnamon and raisins from the recipe. I also found a bourbon recipe that did not require 9 egg yolks and amazingly everyone liked the recipe just as much or more than the complicated one. Top with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream and I also substituted whisky for the bourbon.

We had amazing steak a few nights ago! I buy it at BJs in the big sections and then my husband cuts them nice and thick, so they are better then anything you can get when you go out. The only problem is we always have lots of leftovers, so the best thing to do is to make beef stroganoff! I love this dish and you can whip it up in 20 minutes. My husband added some extra touches to this recipe! We all (kids included) licked every drop of sauce off our plates when we were done.

6. Press into a greased 9 x 13 inch pan. Bake for 20- 25 minutes or until golden brown. Cool 10 minutes. Then cut into squares or rectangles (to make granola bars). Wrap each one in saran wrap. You can freeze these in a big freezer bag and then pull out one for a snack or for lunch boxes.